Diocesan leaders also asked people who are ill to refrain from attending Mass and have urged prayers for the recovery of those afflicted by the illness and for their family members and other caretakers.

Lord, why do you grant me the grace to see you so clearly, yet deny this same gift to the one whom I so desperately love?

Jesus Christ, you traveled through towns and villages “curing every disease and illness.” Come to our aid now, that we may experience your healing love.

“The function of prayer is not to influence God,” Kierkegaard said, “but rather to change the nature of the one who prays.”